Man charged with a felony for defrauding The Home Depot store

Felony charges have been levied against Todd D. Livinghouse, a Laureldale man, for committing multiple instances of fraud at the Home Depot store in Wyomissing.

An affidavit of probable cause states that Derek Morway, the Limited Practice Officer (LPO) for the Home Depot, reported that a suspect, identified as Todd D. Livinghouse, had committed nine separate instances of retail theft from The Home Deport store.

Upon further investigation, police said on nine different days between June 16 and August 14, 2014, Livinghouse was observed pushing a shopping cart into the store.

Livinghouse took cans of paint from the store, on each day and then passed by manned registers on his way out without paying for the merchandise.

Later, on each of those days, either Livinghouse or one of two accomplices walked back into the store and fraudulently returned the items without receipts for store credit in the full amount of the stolen items plus the sales tax.

According to police, five times out of nine, Livinghouse returned the merchandise himself, while on three occasions, he conspired with an accomplice, Michael Myers, to return the items and on one other occasion, another man named Jeffrey A. Bechtel Sr. returned the items.

Livinghouse and his accomplices received between $269 to $358 dollars for a total of 3,150 dollars loss to The Home Depot store, police said.

Livinghouse is accused of receiving and retaining moveable property of The Home Depot with no intention of retuning the items.

He is also accused of creating a false impression by retuning items that he implied he had bought from the store when he had rather stolen them form the store, returned them without a receipt for numerous store credits.

Livinghouse is charged with nine counts of retail theft, nine counts of receiving stolen property, and nine counts of conspiracy, theft by deception and false impressions.

He is in the Berks County Jail, unable to post $25,000 bail.

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